Saying no.

[Chuck Ellsworth]

I am getting PM's from entry level pilots asking me about saying no to an employer who tries to intimidate you into flying against the regulations.

In over fifty years of flying there was only one instance that I was terminated for refusing to accept an overweight load.

The troubling part was it was one of the biggest operators in the charter business and the client was one of the biggest in the oil business.......the company had agreed to flying the overload which was simple to figure out as it was dynamite in fifty pound boxes. And to make it even more frustrating I never got paid for the two weeks I was in their employ.

I lost other jobs because I refused to be intimidated but it was a slower process.

Getting fired for saying no or quitting a company that expects you to break the rules and risk losing your career or your life is like getting rid of a dose of clap.....the sooner you get rid of it the less painful it will be.

[Beefitarian]

You pussy! I bet they found a bunch of guys that were not afraid to fly those planes overloaded with dynamite. Probably for lower wages too.

[Mig29]

At the end of the day, it's your gut feeling and your life at stake. One aviation job more or less is nothing compared to losing your life, and maybe taking many others along with you.

[pinecone160]

.

[Chuck Ellsworth]

Has anyone in aviation ever been helped in a wrongful dismissal case by the above government agency?

[Rockie]

Ask yourself if you would rather be unemployed or dead. Ask your wife if she would rather go with you to the unemployment office or escort your casket to the graveyard. Decide if your kids would rather have an unemployed Dad or no Dad.

Simple really when you think of it in those terms.

[sky's the limit]

Ask yourself why on Earth you think a job, any job, is worth putting yourself in conflict with the law, your principals, or your ethics, and exposing yourself to extreme liability...

I just don't understand why everyone in our culture is so afraid to lose a job, or quit a job, or refuse a job? It's just a job, there are always others, and if you get a reputation for being fired, or walking away from shady employers you'll be amazed just how many good ones will start calling. Funny how that happens.

stl

[trey kule]

Lots of good advice here. Hope some pilots take it.. I would like to add my .02

1. If you have to pause to question doing something, chances are you should not do it.
2. If you use the rationale that there are 50 guys out there that will jump in and do it...be gracious, step aside. and let them risk their lives and their passangers lives
3. the people who are asking or demanding you do something dangerous or illegal are the same people that will tell the investigators after the accident that you were the PIC, and the decision was entirely up to you..In over 40 years of flying I have not seen an exception to this.

On the other hand, a pilot must understand what is legal and can safely be expected of them
I have seen pilots trot our the most misinterpretted example of a regulation to cover up their inability, or just out of laziness.

Lastly, I think some PDM classes should add a "be tactful" part to their syllabus.. Pax understand when you tell them that your job is to safely transport them, and to put in everything they want would put everyone in danger if anything went a bit sideways.
They have a bit different response when you say...No fu...ing way I am flying all that.
Same goes with an emplyer..Nicely put...No can do boss. Badlyput..fly the fu...ing this yourself"

In any event Rockie and some of the others stated it well. But remember if you choose to do it..You are not a victim, you are a gang memeber, and no excuses to the contrary will change that.

[snoopy]

A good company would not have sold the customer on the most optimistic and/or unrealistic payload in the first place - therefore saying no should never be an issue, and only rarely required. Unfortunately, in my experience this type of company seems to be the exception, not the norm.
Cheers,
Kirsten B.

[. ._]

Has anyone in aviation ever been helped in a wrongful dismissal case by the above government agency?

Or any job by the provincial labour agencies?

BAAAAAHAHAHAAAAA!!!!

., sometimes you crack me up.

[trey kule]

Well Maple leaf, I see little problem with the scenario you offered. The solution, of course , is to do a fuel cache. It might take two trips 1/2 way up to cache fuel. Then the plane can carry the gear. Stop at the fuel cache. Fly and drop off supplies. Return to the fuel cache, and home.
Helicopters do fuel caching all the time.

The problem here is the cost of the two extra trips to cache fuel. No one wants to pay for that.

The other option , of course , is to use a bigger aircraft if available and it will fit the mission. Or as it typically done, a waiver allowing a higher MTOW..An increase in exposure to risk but legal and it is done .

It is really not an impossible task, It is all about the cost.

The logistics are rough, but there was not alot of detail in your scenario.

[Siddley Hawker]

You pussy! I bet they found a bunch of guys that were not afraid to fly those planes overloaded with dynamite. Probably for lower wages too.

And probably carried the caps along with the nitro.

[Panama Jack]

You will never really be a Captain until you can say “NO!”
-Sal Fallucco

http://airline-command.blogspot.com/200 ... ay-no.html

http://airline-command.blogspot.com/200 ... chive.html

[Chuck Ellsworth]

The scenario that Mapleflag outlined is simple.

The flight is to long for the airplane being used without a fuel cache.

Therefore the flight can not be done, unless you are willing to face the consequences of having something go wrong and you end up having an accident....and get injured or worse killed.

If we all agree that with due regard for safety the primary intent of an operator is to generate revenue, please let me present a little case study for consideration.

The operator has clear guidelines as to what his/her equipment can safely fly and remain legal and within the rules of safety, so if your equipment can not do the job buy a bigger airplane or refuse the flight.

[Nephilim]

Here is a real life scenario acting out as we speak.

Refused unsafe work as the chief pilot after five years of lies and compromised flight safety standards.

My complaint and accident investigation request were ignored or not believed by Transport Canada, Labour Canada, R.C.M.P. and O.P.P. although after two years their investigation reports were some 160 pages in length. Through Access to Information I received 25 pages of these investigation reports mostly blackened out, but able to prove false reporting by TC and the TSB, which was only corrected by TSB several weeks ago. The remaining 135 pages of documents they will not release to me!

I reported to the Labour Standards Program, and was promptly force-fired by the employer! My complaints of harassment and violence in the workplace were justified according to the Labour Program, and they sent in an independent Health and Safety Officer to review. One year later the report is completed, but I don’t get a copy because by then I was not employed with that company. The company is now in compliance with where they should have been at the time of my complaints, but I am out of a job and injured unable to return to work as a pilot.

There was an injury involved in my case, which the employer ignored, aggravating my health. The Canadian Human Rights Commission was called in to investigate, and yet despite the evidence to prove my case the CHRC ruled that it was not in the public interest to further investigate the matter? I have appealed that decision.

Lots of chat on these Forums about duty times, hours, etc but I have not seen a discussion about pilot/managers where the situation can be much worse. You can go fly as a line pilot 12 hours a night single pilot VFR (night in Canada?) with no ground support whatsoever, get duty timed out, get home to rest and the phone rings at 10 am the next morning. Time for the office work part of your duties! For small companies that cannot (or will not) commit to the appropriate amount of pilots to get the job done, the chief pilot fills in on the gaps and his/her time off requirements go out the window. For example two weeks off in five years! Why do you continue to work under such conditions? Promises and the preverbal carrot of improvements until eventually it must stop. On top of that, my contract stated that any missed days off would be rolled together and accumulated, but of course that was out the window too with a loophole found by the employer. For this policy to have been valid, time requested off was to be in writing annually, however, the employer verbally waived that requirement.

Pilots! We would have more protection through provincial governments, except that by the fact of being in the transportation industry, is regulated Federally, which sucks. More incompetence and bureaucratic BS! And Workers Compensation Boards (although provincial) are a joke. They work for the employer not the injured worker! And if you are not protected by a union under any of the scenarios as discussed above, well then you are on your own and it isn’t fun.

While I am ranting, pilots seem to be the quickest people to morn another aviator’s death or injury, but then are the quickest to rip their fellow pilots wide open to advance themselves or their friends if the pilot survives. I have seen this many times in my 35 years experience in this industry, and it is a pity.

Fire away boys and girls.

Ps. Help! I cannot recall if it is in the CAR’s or Aviation Occupational Health and Safety. I’ve looked at both and can’t seem to find it, but is I think a regulation that states that it is both the operator and the pilot together that is responsible for fatigue management? Thanks

[snoopy]

As to fatigue:
http://www.tc.gc.ca/eng/civilaviation/r ... htm#602_02

Fitness of Flight Crew Members

602.02 No operator of an aircraft shall require any person to act as a flight crew member and no person shall act as a flight crew member, if either the person or the operator has any reason to believe, having regard to the circumstances of the particular flight to be undertaken, that the person

(a) is suffering or is likely to suffer from fatigue; or
(b) is otherwise unfit to perform properly the person's duties as a flight crew member.

Cheers,
Kirsten B.

[Nephilim]

Thank you Snoopy.

[Beefitarian]

That sounds brutal Nephilim. Do you feel like you are recovering from your health issues at all?

[Shiny Side Up]

I just don't understand why everyone in our culture is so afraid to lose a job, or quit a job, or refuse a job? It's just a job, there are always others, and if you get a reputation for being fired, or walking away from shady employers you'll be amazed just how many good ones will start calling. Funny how that happens.

I definitely understand how it happens. I remember the first job I walked off of when I refused to do unsafe work. It was one of the toughest things I ever did. I remember when I was a kid I was brought up, there was a stigma to being unemployed. My father was pretty adamant that no child of his would ever collect UI (as it was called back in the day before a strange political correctness changed it to EI to avoid the negative connotations with collecting on it). I can see where this sort of attitude is fostered from a different time when work was a lot harder to come by. Some of the tales my Dad, my uncles and my grandfathers told of the brutal and primitive conditions they worked in made some of the stuff we might see as safety issues today as peanuts - and its been tough to change public opinion on that. That opinion though has changed and its been a good thing - vestiges of it still hang around, but one can reasonably stick to one's guns and turn it around.

The more insidious thing I've seen in my time in the workplace however has been this sort of notion actively pushed by larger companies and corporations. I've seen a lot of people whom I could only have been described as brainwashed by their employer into thinking that should they blow a whistle or quit that they will never be able to gain employment again. An utter lie, but a lot of people believe it. They live in fear of losing their jobs. They don't realise that the world has changed to benefit the worker, and it is indeed their marketplace for jobs, not the other way around. Regardless of the industry (even the aviation one, despite what some may think) there is always a demand for good workers.

What has always suprised me is how the best workers often feel this way and greatly undervalue their worth to their employers, and bad workers often have a very high opinion of their abilities, and manage to find work in spite of even have been "dishonorably discharged" from previous jobs. The world is really f*cked up in that regard.

[floatplanepilot]

Has anyone in aviation ever been helped in a wrongful dismissal case by the above government agency?

Yes. I know of a couple. Both won their cases and the companies paid out.

[Mig29]

That was one pretty depressing read Nephilim. I really hope you are recovering from all of this and have found some peace. It is pretty disappointing when you go through all of these Gov't agencies for help, and they just turned their backs or pretend they didn't see anything. Sometimes I wonder if it's better in certain cases just to resign and walkway with no headaches and a clean reputation, with hopes of gaining a better job down the road, then to put up a fight with these morons?

While I am ranting, pilots seem to be the quickest people to morn another aviator’s death or injury, but then are the quickest to rip their fellow pilots wide open to advance themselves or their friends if the pilot survives. I have seen this many times in my 35 years experience in this industry, and it is a pity.

I agree with you on this 100%!!

[whyisitdoingthat]

Wow, too true indeed.

I think a lot can be gained from seeing how politics works overseas then applying it back home here in Canada. We are raised to expect justice, and when it is denied we are in shock and disgusted. As we should be. However covering one's 6 politically is the same here as anywhere else. Except here it's just a little harder to do. Clearly that company got a tounge lashing for what they were up to, or knew they were in the wrong then changed their ways since they are now in compliance as you say.

However, in this case they felt their own needs for continued operation and repution outweighted yours for justice and they simply knew the right people to make it go away. And if it get's legal, they'll probably have the right amount of money to make it go away by making you run out of money first.

The nasty truth is that the fat cat will nearly always win. Obviuosly the damage has been done but perhaps you could so some quick math and see how much it would cost them to defend against a lawsuit. Them and also anyone in the government that looks like they're in on it. Then offer to settle for just a little bit less. Or see i you can pull a Spanish Prisoner and have them play off against each other. Either way I fear all you can do here is try to cut your losses. No one has deep enough pockets to fight the fat cat. I know it's brutal but that's just how the world works I think. That really sucks regardless and PM me if I can be of any assistance finding work.

[Bede]

If you break rules to make money for the boss, you will be the bosses best employee, but the second you bend metal because of the bosses encouragement, you will get 0 support and they'll turn on you. Saw it happen to a friend of mine.

I wish AvCanada allowed pilots to discuss companies on this site without taking the thread down at the first threat of litigation.

[trey kule]

The challange with posting company names Bede may be a liability issue for AvCanada. But there is another side to the story. If they allowed names any pilot who was fired with just cause, or maybe just did not get hired, could come on and absolutely bad mouth the company.. Most companies do not want to get into a pissing match in public. Not out of any fear, but because in this world of the interent it is impossible for them to defend themselves against wrongful accustaions. There really is two sides to many of these stories.
As the original poster said, look at how people here react to accidents....once you say how sad you are and offer condolences you can speculate away.

I ofter wonder. Years ago we had an emergency in flight. Fortunately we were able to land without incident or damage. After the inspection was done, we were told that if we had no made it back OK, there was little chance anyone would ever have discovered the cause.
And no doubt there would have been dozens on here speculating as to why we flew into a mountain. It is human nature exempla\ified.

Now back to the topic.
I state this over and over in the hopes some people will listen..Put everythng in writing. Learn how to write a factual report..time date, people, etc, and email a copy to the company . Do it the very first time it happens. Dont wait .. If they fire you , you have proof.
On the other hand, if you just do things verbally, and keep on working there, the question is going to come up that if it was as bad as you said it was why did you continue to work there..It is a very fair question to ask. If the company is doing all sorts of things illegally or unsafe and you continue to work for them you are not a vicitm any longer. You are part of the problem.. Unfortunately what usually happens is people quit or get fired and then try to reconstruct things retroactively.
One of the thngs good companies can (and do) do, is have a daily flight report( or equivalent) that crews fill in at the end of every day. It requires notification of any deviaitons to SOPs, regulations, unsafe practices, late refuelers, pax complaints...Anything. In my opinion this should be made a regulatory requirment.
A pilot that does not fill it out properly is part of the problem. On the other hand, it is a great tool for monitoring SOP's, crew issues.

[sstaurus]

Interesting thread. Nothing to add, just wanted to say that there are guys like me young in their career who get use out of discussions like this.